From: PaT2118@aol.com
Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2003 5:43 PM
To: Rule-Comments@SEC.GOV
Subject: Re: File No. S7-10-03
June 6, 2003
Mr. Jonathan G. Katz, Secretary
Securities and Exchange Commission
450 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20549-0609
RE: File No. S7-10-03
Dear Mr. Katz:
On behalf of the 500 beneficiaries of the Anheuser-Busch/Teamsters Local Union
Pension Plan, I am writing to urge the Securities and Exchange Commission to
adopt rules requiring corporations to list shareholder nominees in the corporate
proxy statement.
Investors have just come through an extraordinary market failure, with $7 trillion
evaporating from the equity markets in three years. Accounting scandals at
companies like Enron, WorldCom, Tyco and HEALTHSOUTH exposed widespread conflicts
of interest and a shocking lack of corporate accountability to shareholders. We
commend the SEC for responding with an unprecedented series of regulatory reforms
to address the conflicts, but no amount of government regulation can ensure
corporate accountability unless it includes rules that will allow shareholders a
realistic opportunity to select directors who will represent their interests.
Shareholders ostensibly have the right to nominate and elect directors. But,
under current practice, this is a right without any substance and shareholders
have no meaningful way to hold directors accountable regardless of how poorly a
company performs, how much they overpay the CEO, or how conflicted the auditors
are that they retain. In fact, given the tremendous costs and obstacles of
conducting a proxy fight, shareholders currently can do little more than
rubberstamp candidates nominated by the directors themselves.
The SEC has the ability to restore genuine accountability to the boardroom by
establishing the minimal basic procedure necessary to afford shareholders a real
choice in corporate elections. Specifically, granting equal access to the proxy
statement will not only allow shareholders to nominate directors who we trust to
independently represent our interests, it will also encourage incumbent directors
to be more responsive to our concerns. Therefore, I urge the SEC to use its
current review of the rules governing director nominations and elections to give
shareholders access to the proxy statement for our director nominees.
Sincerely,
Dennis M. Baca
Trustee